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Dantius Palpatine
Palpatine, also known as Darth Sidious, was the last Chancellor of the Galactic Republic and the first Emperor of the Galactic Empire. He was a Dark Lord of the Sith who followed the Rule of Two and was the most powerful Sith Lord the galaxy had ever known. Palpatine was able to establish his Empire by concocting a complex master plan, which involved starting the Clone Wars, a galaxy-wide conflict that cost billions of sentient lives, and secretly playing both sides, until he replaced the Republic with the Galactic Empire and nearly exterminated the Jedi. Biography 'Early Life' Factual information about Palpatine as a child and as a young adult is extremely hard to come by. Records pertaining to his ancestry, immediate family members, and upbringing had mysteriously vanished by the beginning of the New Order. The general assumption is that these records were destroyed to conceal his identity as a Sith, but there is another, though less credible, possibility: there may never have been a real being named Palpatine born on Naboo; Darth Sidious, whose real identity prior to becoming a Sith would therefore be completely unknown, may actually have created the identity of Palpatine in order to enter the political sphere, and so there would be no records about a fictitious ancestry and family to destroy. In any case, it is believed that he was born Dantias Palpatine on Naboo, a world in the backwaters of the Chommell Sector in the Mid Rim Territories. He would claim the planetary capital of Theed, a city on the banks of the Solleu River, as his home city, but it is not certain that he was actually born there. He was not an only child; the existence of a remote grandniece, Ederlathh Pallopides indicates that he had at least one sibling, whose name and gender is unknown. Palpatine's family line remains mysterious, and the identity of his parents has never been discovered. Palpatine claimed that his father, had left the family while he was still a baby, and did not meet his father until age 12. He was not an only child, the existence of a remote niece, Ederlathh Pallopides indicates that he had at least one sibling, whose name and gender is unknown. Palpatine spent the majority of his childhood living with his mother and a string of stepfathers and claimed that one of his stepfathers, Leo Lupton, used to beat his mother and would attack him as well when he tried to protect her. There is evidence that suggests, that Palpatine may have killed the abusive step-father with his force abilities. 'First Encounter' As difficult as it is to learn concrete facts about Palpatine's youth, information on how he became a Sith Lord is even more scarce. It is possible that Palpatine's killing of his step-father is what caught the attention of Darth Plagueis, a Muun Dark Lord of the Sith. Suffice it to say that somehow, his Force-sensitivity escaped the notice of the Jedi Order. Apprenticeship Having judged the young Palpatine worthy of joining the Sith, Darth Plagueis formally initiated him into the cult. From the time of Darth Bane onward, it was common for Sith names to begin with the forename Darth, a moniker that was as much a title as a name. Many factors went into deciding on the second name. At least one, based on observed ceremonies, is that Sith masters would enter a kind of communion with the dark side of the Force, question it, and within it find inspiration, an answer.11 Exactly what inspiration Plagueis found in this communion has not been revealed, but Plagueis decided that, from that moment forward, Palpatine would be known as Darth Sidious. Darth Sidious's apprenticeship has been described as lasting many decades, though there is no specific indication of when it began or when it ended. In that time, Plagueis trained Sidious in accordance with Darth Bane's tradition. During the course of Sidious's training, Darth Plagueis once allowed him access to a number of Sith holocrons, items that, according to the arcane writing inscribed on their pyramidal surfaces, were recorded in the days of Darth Bane. The Jedi mistakenly believed that these holocrons sat in the Archives room in their Temple, but those were actually clever forgeries, a form of Sith disinformation. How the actual and false holocrons came to their respective owners is still not known. The Murder of Darth Plagueis Plagueis was obsessed with immortality. He delved into forbidden teachings, and possessed—or sought to possess—knowledge that could sustain those who were dying, or even return them from death. Both the Jedi and the Sith had sought ways to survive death for thousands of years, without success. The most powerful of the ancient Sith Lords, particularly Darth Sion and Darth Andeddu, supposedly knew such secrets, but they had been lost or misplaced. Plagueis then began taking his research to its greatest extreme, to create new life from nothing. Eventually Plagueis told Sidious of an experiment to influence the midi-chlorians to draw life directly from the Force itself. The child that resulted, Plagueis insisted, would potentially possess astounding powers. Sidious at once suspected that Plagueis's real intention was to "create" a new apprentice to replace him. His position threatened, Sidious decided that he had learned all he could from Plagueis, as he had already recruited his own secret apprentice in the form of Darth Maul. Soon after, Sidious killed Plagueis in his sleep and took the title of Sith Master for himself. To make certain the same thing would never happen to him, he kept a close eye on his own apprentices, and told them only the barest minimum of information about Plagueis. For much of his life, he would be on his guard, vowing to himself never to make the mistake of sleeping as Plagueis had. 'The training of Darth Maul' Shortly before he had murdered Plagueis, Palpatine had recruited a young Zabrak from his family on Iridonia, and had begun training him as a Sith. It was not without precedent that Sidious should have chosen a Zabrak for his apprentice. In ancient times, the Sith, taking notice of the martial prowess of the Zabrak, made lucrative contacts on Iridonia, and spent exorbitant sums to hire Iridonian Zabrak as mercenaries. Long after the Sith culture died out, the influence of the Sith remained a part of Zabrak culture. Zabraks were known to endure extreme amounts of pain, but nothing could have prepared young Maul for the brutality of Palpatine's training. Despite Palpatine's harshness, Maul held the utmost respect for the man, and for most of his life, was fanatically loyal. A visit to the Jedi Temple When Darth Maul was very young—so young that he would remember few memories prior to this (c. 54–52 BBY)—Darth Sidious took him to the Jedi Temple, both of them disguised as tourists. Sidious's command of the dark side was sufficient to keep both himself and Maul from being sensed by the Jedi, as long as they did not enter the Temple itself. As the building was not open to tourists in any event, there was very little risk of discovery. For the better part of a day, they stood there, and Sidious pointed out to Maul the various faces of individual Jedi as they entered and left the Temple, whispering into his apprentice's ear of the Jedi Order's ultimate destruction. Maul would long remember the thrill of seeing his foes, standing in their presence, hearing about their downfall, as they walked past, not one of them aware of the fate that ultimately awaited them. Eventually, the time came for Maul's final test. Palpatine sent him out to a remote and isolated world, where he was hunted by assassin droids for a month. At the end of the month, Maul found Palpatine waiting at the mouth of a cave. Maul had not eaten for days, and was exhausted. Regardless, Palpatine challenged Maul to a duel, in which Maul was easily defeated. Palpatine stood over the broken man, and told him that he had been preparing another apprentice, should Maul fail as he had. Enraged, Maul flew at Palpatine with murderous intent. Palpatine was caught off guard, but was able to disarm Maul. Even without a weapon, Maul continued to attack, even going so far as to bite Sidious's hand before being ultimately defeated. Pleased, Sidious announced that Maul's training was complete, and that he was now a Sith Lord. 'The beginning of Palpatine's political career' Palpatine began his political career at a young age, carefully hiding his true persona of Darth Sidious. On Naboo, public service was mandatory from the ages of twelve to twenty, and he began his political career in this fashion (70–62 BBY). Unlike most of the Naboo, however, he elected to stay in politics beyond the normally accepted age. He entered local Naboo politics (62–52 BBY), working his way upward. He lost more elections than he won, missing out on a string of political appointments. When Senator Vidar Kim, Naboo's representative in the Galactic Senate, was assassinated by a never-identified gunman on a passing airspeeder (52 BBY), the thirty-year-old Palpatine stood for election to succeed him. The people of Naboo elected him as their sectorial Senator, to represent Naboo and the thirty-five other affiliated worlds of the Chommell Sector. It is not known if Palpatine, Plagueis, or any of their allies had anything to do with the murder, but whoever ordered it, only Palpatine stood to gain from it. The Sistros statue When Palpatine first came to Coruscant to begin his service in the Senate, a number of his personal effects came with him from Naboo, accompanied by a manifest. The manifest was submitted to Republic officials as part of a standard security scan. This procedure was mandatory for all equipment and furniture to enter the Senate building. One of these items was an abstract sculpture of Sistros, one of the Four Sages of Dwartii (these were controversial philosopher-lawgivers who lived during the early days of the Republic—the others were Faya, Yanjon, and Braata). Palpatine's manifest clearly stated that this sculpture was a single piece of solid-forged neuranium with a bronzium finish. But the sculpture was not solid; it contained a small cylindrical cavity, in which rested one of his Sith lightsabers, sealed within the sculpture at the time of its forging. The security scan did not detect this cavity; neuranium was so dense that any piece more than a millimeter in thickness was impervious to sensors, and since nothing unusual was found in the scan, no one questioned it further. An advanced gravimetric detector would have revealed that one small section of the sculpture massed slightly less than it should have, but no one thought to use one at the time. The sculpture was admitted and placed in Palpatine's Senate offices (the floor had to be specially reinforced to bear its weight), and when Palpatine was elected Chancellor it was moved into the anteroom of his Suite in the Executive Office Building. Only after thirty-three years would Palpatine extract the blade within. Personality and Traits Romantic Interests Notes |BG1=900 |BG2=800 Links